Truck falls into pit, six kids hurt

Tuesday

May 29, 2007 at 2:00 AM

NEWMARKET — Police released a Dover woman on $2,500 personal recognizance bail Sunday night after charging her with second degree assault, a felony, in connection with an accident that injured six children.

Susan Nolan

NEWMARKET — Police released a Dover woman on $2,500 personal recognizance bail Sunday night after charging her with second degree assault, a felony, in connection with an accident that injured six children.

Police said Jana Curti, 45, of 21 Spur Road was driving with seven children in the open bed of her 2006 Toyota Tacoma pickup truck when the dirt road suddenly ended and the truck plunged off a small cliff and into a sand pit just after 6 p.m. Sunday.

Two Newfields children — one age 7 and another age 13 — were among the six injured. A 10-year-old Dover child and a 16-year-old Greenland resident were also injured, Police Officer Wayne Stevens said Monday night.

Two of the children were seriously injured, police said. Names of the children still were not released on Monday, and their conditions were unknown.

The accident took place on the back acres of the "old Smith Farm" at 358 Wadleigh Falls Road, Newmarket, where an estate auction had taken place earlier in the day at the home, which was recently sold.

"The owner is in a nursing home and the contents of her farm house, barn & outbuildings must be sold," said an ad by George Foster III, the Epsom auctioneer who facilitated sale of the contents of the old home and barn.

A woman who was on scene after the accident said the children and Curti were all related to the homeowner, and that Curti was taking the children on a final tour of the farm where they had all spent time growing up.

She said Curti didn't know the road suddenly ended because there had been excavation on the property since she had last driven down the dirt road.

All seven children were tossed around the truck bed or thrown from it when it hit the bottom of the pit, emergency officials said.

Newmarket Fire Chief Rick Malasky said Sunday one of the severely injured children had pelvic and chest injuries and another had eye and head injuries. Two of the six children were transported to Portsmouth Regional Hospital, and four were transported to Exeter Hospital

Ambulances from Durham, Stratham, Epping along with Exeter Hospital paramedics responded to the scene.

Curti will be arraigned in Exeter District Court July 3, Police Chief Kevin Cyr said Monday. Cyr said earlier that he had "not ruled out anything" including alcohol as a factor in the accident.

One local man who attended the auction said the family group had been together during the auction, cheering each time one of them won the bid on the items from their family's farm. Historic pictures, paintings, Civil War memorabilia, and a five-piece Victorian parlor set were among the hundreds of items sold.

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